A group of French chefs is threatening to ban cameras and mobile phones from
their restaurants. But what is the verdict of the Brits?

It’s a familiar restaurant scenario. A group of you are seated round the table, the waiter appears, the dishes are placed in front of each diner. But as you pick up your knife and fork, one of your number cries, “Wait a moment!” Brandishing a mobile phone in a stance more suited to a vampire hunter with a crucifix, they leap forward, head cocked as they consider the aesthetic advantages of the plates’ presentation: fish fillet foremost or tomato on top? Then, the click-click of the virtual camera shutter starts, our friend leaning over at improbable angles, tweaking the plate first a millimeter this way, then that. Between each excoriating pop of the flashlight, they frantically swipe at the phone screen, brow furrowed, before muttering, “just one more”.

Ten minutes later, when you finally all settle down to eat, the food seems not only unappetizingly congealed, but also pimped. That moment of anticipation, when the smell of the food is enticing you to the first mouthful, has been subsumed into a photo opportunity.

Well, a band of French chefs think so anyway. A group of French chefs, including one with the coveted three Michelin stars, has been threatening to ban cameras and mobile phones from their restaurants. Alexandre Gauthier, chef at the Grenouillere restaurant in La Madelaine-sous-Montreuil, 40 miles from Calais, has even gone as far as putting a picture of a camera with a line through it on his menu. Which if it’s not a ban on cameras – and he says it isn’t – is at least a sign of grave displeasure. I wouldn’t like to think what you might find in your boeuf bourgignon after wielding an iPhone over your soupe aux poissons. And in New York, ever at the forefront, some restaurants have issued a genuine prohibition on picture taking.

But hang on. I regularly take pictures of dishes in restaurants, though generally as an aide memoire in case I need to write about the dish afterwards. Sometimes I tweet the picture, but if I do it’s in admiration – to shout about the excellence, and to give potential diners some idea of what to expect. I look at other people’s food photographs in the same spirit. These days restaurants court bloggers and tweeters as social networking is a valuable marketing tool. So shouldn’t chefs be celebrating the free publicity that a Twitter or Instagram photograph gives them?

Certainly the British chefs I contacted were more phlegmatic than their Gallic counterparts. Daniel Doherty, chef at the perennially packed Duck and Waffle at the top of London’s Heron Tower, did issue a caveat however, tweeting, “I don't mind … but if said pics take 10 mins and you complain food is cold...” And it’s not hard to understand the kitchen’s irritation, especially when the photographs are often so inept that the dishes that the chef has slaved over look like something dished up in a third-rate service station.

As for the accusations that even the best pictures reduce restaurant dishes to food porn – the chefs can hardly complain when, let’s face it, they are at it too. Social media is peppered with the gastronomic equivalent of selfies as the professional cooks pap their latest creations. Russell Brown of Michelin starred Sienna in Dorchester cheerfully owned up: “I tweet enough pictures of my own food so can hardly complain if others do.” But Shaun Hill, the revered chef at the Walnut Tree Inn near Abergavenny was more traditional, saying he was “puzzled” by the practice as “it is the flavours that [are] important, not the look.” Rowley Leigh from the Café Anglais added with typical forthrightness, “It’s the pernicious influence of telly cookery.” None, however would go so far as to ban cameras.

Even sometime-firebrand Marco Pierre White, who gave up his three Michelin star restaurant to concentrate on a group of informal steakhouses and the fine dining restaurants on P& O cruise ships, is perplexed by the fuss. “If people want to take photographs, let them take photographs. The chefs that don’t want them are just insecure about their dishes.” He agrees, though, that the flash can be annoying, although so can noisy telephone conversations. “Some restaurants do ban mobiles. I hate people on mobile phones in restaurants,” he told me, before adding with a shrug and a drag on his Benson and Hedges, “Mind you I do it too, all the time.”

The British chefs' verdict? French chefs need to get over themselves, but the British diner would do well to remember that a restaurant is about dining, not digital wizardry. What do you think?

How to take photographs of food in restaurants

Turn off the annoying clickety-click shutter noise on the phone or camera before starting.

Work fast – if the whole process is taking more than three seconds (ok, five) give up. Concentrating on your phone or camera screen is as rude to your companions as playing Angry Bird at table.

Don’t use flash. Ever. It’s not just startling, and so irritating for other diners, it makes for food pictures that look like the scene of a crime. Best option? Visit at lunchtime and ask for a window seat. Failing that, keeping a steady hand or propping the phone on a glass as a makeshift tripod to compensate for a long exposure will do the job better than a flash bulb.

If the light really isn’t good enough and you must take a photo, then ask your companion to to light the dish with their phone’s torch app.

Unless you are very adept, food tends to look better taken very close up – so don’t be afraid to lose the edge of the plate. Even better, crop all the plate – that way you won’t have to rearrange the surrounding glasses and cutlery.

For less-than-Cecil-Beatons, the safest food shot on a phone camera is straight over the dish. Don’t stand up if you can possibly avoid it though, unless you want to draw attention to yourself.

It goes without saying that food is best photographed before you start eating it. But forget photographing shared plates unless you are with other supper snappers – it’s too irritating to your dining companions to be told they can’t tuck in until the David Bailey wannabe has finished.

Use an app like Perfect Photo (69p on iTunes) to make adjustments to the colour and exposure after you’ve taken the picture – but wait until you get home to fiddle with your masterpiece.